Mumbai: A 74-year-old woman, retired from a reputed national level educational institution, was threatened with arrest in a fake money laundering case by fraudsters who pretended to be Delhi crime branch police and CBI officers and cheated her of Rs 4.62 crore. The accused asked the septuagenarian to send all her money to them for ‘scrutiny’, assuring it would be returned to her once it is cleared.The senior citizen on Tuesday lodged an FIR with the west region cyber police station against the unidentified accused. The crime took place between Oct 11 last year and Jan 4 this year.On Oct 11 last year, the complainant first received a WhatsApp video call from an unidentified person who said he was from the Telecom dept. The accused told her that a sexual harassment case was registered against her. When the woman refused her involvement in any wrong act, another person identifying himself as Sushil Kumar Gautam, IPS, Delhi police, asked her to lodge a complaint. The accused told her that her Aadhaar card was used in opening a bank account which was then used in money laundering and that there were illegal financial transactions of Rs 6 crore. The officer told the woman that a case of money laundering was registered against her for it. The complainant told the ‘officer’ that she did not have any such bank account, as mentioned by the accused. The accused told her that one person ,Sandeep Kumar, had been arrested in the money laundering case and she can also be arrested any time. He threatened her and asked her to answer his questions or they would come to her house to arrest her and her family members. He asked her not to tell anyone about this investigation and if she told anyone, they would be arrested too. The accused then collected information about her bank accounts, savings, fixed deposits etc. A fake CBI officer told her that it was a sensitive case. The complainant again requested that she had no involvement in any crime. The accused then asked her to send all her money to them for ‘security procedure’. Scared, the woman sent Rs 4.62 crore over 10 transactions to various accounts provided by them.When she called them up for a refund, the accused gave her evasive replies and demanded more money. This is when she got the number of the Delhi police from the internet and contacted them to inquire about IPS officer Sushil Gautam. She was told there was no officer in the Delhi crime branch with this name and that she had been cheated.
